- 7 jan 2011
Olive trees uprooted; villagers say setters behind vandalism
NABLUS (Ma'an) -- More than 100 small olive trees were uprooted from outside of Qasra village in the northern West Bank, with villagers saying settlers were behind the vandalism.
Palestinian official in charge of settlement watch in the north Ghassan Daghlas said villagers reported to him seeing several men wearing skullcaps who they identified as settlers, pulling out the young trees on lands belonging to one of the village residents.
Abed Ar-Razeq Daoud Abdllah Auda had planted the field three months earlier, some five dunums of lands, with olive trees. Villagers had gathered to help the farmer, whose lands abut the nearby settlement outpost known as Esta.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=348968 14 jan 2012, 17:51 , Respect -
Settlers Uproot 100 Saplings Near Nablus
Israeli settlers uprooted on Friday at least 100 Olive saplings that belong to residents of Qasra village, southeast of the northern West Bank city of Nablus. The settlers collected the cut saplings and fled the scene.
The attacked orchard is located near the village, and belongs to resident Abdul-Raziq Abdullah Odah.
Ghassan Douglas, in charge of settlements file in the northern part of the West Bank, stated that the settlers came from an illegal outpost known an Extra.
On Thursday, the settlers took by force more than 65 Dunams of Palestinian lands that belong to residents of Ein Jaloud village, near Nablus.
Last month, Jewish settlers occupied hundreds of Dunams of Palestinian orchards and fenced several Palestinian orchards.
http://www.imemc.org/article/60366 14 jan 2012, 17:52 , Respect -
Outgoing UNRWA director plants saplings near Nablus
NABLUS (Ma'an) – The outgoing director of UNRWA operations Barbara Shenstone on Monday planted olive tree saplings on land slated for confiscation in the northern West Bank.
Shenstone joined Palestinian beneficiaries of the UN Money for Work program to plant 360 saplings in an attempt to save over 30,000 square meters of land in the the village of Burin, south of Nablus.
Participants considered Shenstone's attendance a message reflective of the UN agency's continuous support for Palestinian refugees and farmers to help them protect their lands.
Palestinian Authority ministry officials and EC humanitarian aid representatives were also present.
Shenstone said planting olive trees was a way to protect Palestinian lands from confiscation by Israeli settlers. The activity would also recruit international attention to the village, she added.
The UN Money for Work program is implemented in partnership with the PA Ministry of Agriculture through a range of projects including the "Green Palestine" project which started in 2009.
Thousands of tree saplings have been planted in several West Bank villages where agricultural roads have been rehabilitated to help farmers access their lands easily and tend them.
The program allocates money for some 500 work opportunities every month in areas under threat of confiscation such as lands classified as "Area C" under the Oslo Accords, villages close to the separation wall, Bedouin villages, and remote areas.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=360073 14 jan 2012, 17:56 , Respect -
Society: Israel confiscates land near Hebron
HEBRON (Ma'an) -- Israeli authorities on Thursday issued land confiscation orders in a village near the West Bank city of Hebron, the Palestinian Agricultural Relief Society said.
Israeli officials handed a warrant to the family of Khalil Abed Alghani Al-Hurub ordering the confiscation of 20 dunums of his land in Kharas, west of Hebron, the society said.
The organization said Israeli authorities claimed the land was state property.
Head of the society Abed Al-Ghani Saya'reh said Israel had issued warrants for hundreds of dunums of village land, targeting areas 300 meters inside the separation wall. The land was planted with olive and almond trees, he added.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=361123 14 jan 2012, 17:58 , Respect -
Israelis chop down 220 olive trees envisioning settlement expansion
NABLUS, (PIC)-- Jewish settlers in the West Bank were certainly encouraged after the U.S. struck down a resolution that would have thwarted settlement activity for good. In Nablus, Yash Adam settlers attacked a Palestinian-owned farm noon Sunday, chopping down hundreds of olive trees. Other settlers beat up the night before entire families in the Jordan Valley.
Jewish settlers from Yash Adam infiltrated an olive grove between the villages of Qasra and Doma south of Nablus and used saws to cut down 220 trees under protection of other settlers armed with machine guns and automatic weapons.
Locals said the act was aimed at expanding and thus linking isolated settlement outposts by taking Palestinian land.
Palestinian parliamentarians from the Hamas bloc called on the Palestinian Authority headed by Mahmoud Abbas to shoulder its responsibilities and protect the Palestinian people and their property from settler mischief.
In a statement they said the attacks were supported by the U.S. veto used to strike down a resolution condemning settlement construction in the West Bank as illegal. They said continued peace talks with Israel were also to blame.
One night earlier, Jews from the Maskiot settlement stormed the Wadi al-Halwa area and assaulted locals.
They threatened to kill the family of Sati Daraghima if they did not evacuate the land and assaulted his wife, witnesses said.
The assailants apparently had sights set on annexing that area to their settlement.
Earlier settlers flooded the area's streets shouting anti-Arab slogans and demanding they leave and not graze in the region.
The incident was witnessed by the Israel army, which has mapped the area as a closed military zone.
http://bit.ly/f8BhaP 14 jan 2012, 17:59 , Respect -
Witnesses: Israeli bulldozers uproot 250 olive trees
HEBRON (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces on Monday uprooted 250 olive trees in Al-Jab'a northwest of Hebron, locals said.
Witnesses said two bulldozers uprooted the trees, which were loaded onto trucks and transported to Israel.
Members of Beit Ummar and Al-Ma'sara local popular committees said they tried to stop the uprooting, but Israeli forces declared the area a closed military zone.
The area is 500 meters from the illegal Beit Ein settlement.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=362399 14 jan 2012, 18:00 , Respect -
Israel destroys agricultural lands near Salfit
SALFIT (Ma'an) -- Israeli bulldozers tore up recently cultivated agricultural lands north of Salfit on Thursday morning, mayor of the nearby Deir Istiya village told Ma'an.
Starting a few hours after sunrise, Mayor Nathmi Suleiman said, the bulldozers entered the village, accompanied by Israeli forces, and began destroying a stone fence separating fields in the Qattan Al-Jame area west of the village.
During its work, the bulldozer ripped out several olive trees, and obliterated the half-meter high hand-crafted stone wall.
Suleiman said the lands affected were owned by Muhammad Abdul Rahman Zeidan from the village, and had been rehabilitated through financial assistance from the Palestinian Agricultural Relief Fund.
The rebuilding of the stone wall, seed planting and tilling had been carried out by volunteers and family members, with a total cost of 20,000 shekels ($5,465).
A spokesman for Israel's Civil Administration did not answer phone calls seeking comment. The Civil Administration is a department set up by the Israeli government to administer and preside over Palestinian lands in the occupied West Bank designated as "Area C."
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=362997 14 jan 2012, 18:03 , Respect -
PA: Settlers vandalize Nablus villages
NABLUS (Ma'an) -- Settlers on Friday escalated attacks against Palestinians in villages south of the West Bank city of Nablus, Palestinian officials said.
Palestinian Authority settlement official Ghassan Doughlas said residents of the illegal Yitzhar settlement set fire to a bulldozer belonging to Ibrahim Ishteiyah in Burin.
Meanwhile in Jit, settlers sprayed racist graffiti and punctured the tires of villagers' cars, Doughlas said.
The PA official added added that settlers chopped down 25 trees belonging to Hassan and Mohammad Safadi in Urif.
In the past week, settlers set fire to two vehicles in Burin and threw a Molotov cocktail at a home, uprooted olive trees planted by UNRWA officials, and injured two others in a mob attack.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=363226 14 jan 2012, 18:06 , Respect -
West Bank: Settlers Destroy 500 Olive Saplings, Three Arrested and Car Impounded in Hebron
Nablus PNN - Israeli settlers near the northern West Bank city of Nablus destroyed at least 500 young olive saplings before dawn on Friday, according to local sources. In the southern West Bank, three Palestinians were arrested near the city of Hebron and a car was confiscated.
The saplings, less than a week old, were destroyed in the village of Qasra, southeast of Nablus. Eyewitnesses said the trees were planted close to an illegal settlement on Palestinian land.
Ghassan Douglas, the Palestinian Authority (PA) official in charge of filing settler attacks in the northern West Bank, confirmed the incident. A local source said the settlers came in the middle of the night.
In al-Walajeh village, near the southern west Bank city of Bethlehem, Palestinians began replanting destroyed olive trees near the planned route of the wall, which completely encircles the small village. Shirin al-Araj of the local Committee Against the Wall and Settlements said it was an effort to reclaim the land.
Near Hebron in the south, three Palestinians were arrested in dawn raids in surrounding villages. The arrestees were 42-year-old Awad Abu Zalteh of Ithna village, 28-year old Hameed Fathi Halayqeh of Shuyukh, and 20-year-old Mustafa Ghanaymat of Sourif. They were taken to an unknown location.
A car belonging to Muhammad al-Qasrawi was confiscated from in front of his home in Wadi al-Huriya in Hebron.
http://bit.ly/hP0D8k
Settlers chop down 500 trees in Nablus
NABLUS (Ma'an) -- Settlers chopped down more than 500 olive trees owned by Palestinians in the West Bank district of Nablus on Friday, Palestinian Authority officials said.
Residents of the illegal Shvut Rachel settlement raided Qusra village and chopped down the trees, said Ghassan Doughlas, PA official for settlement affairs in the northern West Bank.
In a "day of rage" Thursday, right-wing Israelis and settlers blocked a road to Jerusalem and closed down train tracks to the country's airport.
Settlers were protesting the demolition of several structures at an illegal outpost near Nablus by the Israeli government. They threatened to carry-out "price-tag" attacks against Palestinians in response to the government's "anti-settler" activity.
In the past, the "price tag" has included arson, shootings, beatings, burning fields, uprooting trees and poisoning water wells belonging to Palestinians.
Following a recent surge in settler violence -- including fire-bombing Palestinian homes, smashing shops and damaging cars -- the Palestinian Authority on Wednesday urged the international community to intervene and stop the attacks.
http://bit.ly/eggzJs 14 jan 2012, 18:07 , Respect -
Settler, soldiers open fire on Palestinians
NABLUS (AFP) -- Ten Palestinians and an Israeli settler were wounded on Monday during clashes in a village near the northern West Bank city of Nablus, a Palestinian official and witnesses said.
Ghassan Doughlas, an official in charge of tracking settler activity, said six Palestinians were taken to hospital and another four were on the way after being caught up in clashes with settlers in Qusra, a village 10 kilometers southeast of Nablus.
Witnesses said trouble flared when a large group of settlers began uprooting olive trees near the village. The villagers started throwing stones, prompting a settler to open fire.
"We found a lot of settlers uprooting olive trees and when they saw us they started throwing stones at the children, then a settler brought out his M-16 and started shooting at us," said local witness Raed Awdeh.
"We threw stones at them, then the army arrived and started shooting rubber bullets and tear gas bombs," he told AFP.
Medical sources said that so far they had treated eight Palestinians -- four of whom had been hit by live fire, and another four who had been injured by rubber bullets.
The other two were lightly injured by rubber bullets and were treated at the scene, they said.
A Jewish settler was also taken to hospital after being hit by a stone, settler spokeswoman Tamar Asraf told AFP, saying he had been injured by Palestinians who had approached the nearby settlement outpost of Esh Kodesh.
A spokeswoman for the Israeli army confirmed troops had opened fire on what she described as "an extremely violent riot."
"The security forces were attacked by Palestinians with rocks, and in response, they fired directly at those who were throwing rocks," she told AFP, saying troops had used live fire and directed it towards the Palestinians' lower bodies.
"Six Palestinians were injured as a result," she added, saying the incident was under investigation.
Last week, settlers cut down around 500 young olive trees near Qusra which had been planted on the site of a former settlement outpost.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=366533